When Should I Start Training?

Written By Brooke Daerr

This morning (Friday, the 16th) I wrote a short thread on twitter that began with the first post above. A friend of mine asked when he should start training for an event eight months from now and I used the thread to speak broadly about how I think about the answer to that question. However, as I sit here a few hours later I thought it might be interesting to go into a little more detail about what each post might mean in this specific case.

As you can see in the post above, a friend of mine asked me this morning about when he should start training for an event taking place in the back half of 2023. This friend of mine is targeting the 100-mile route of the Steamboat Gravel Race on August 20th. He has a background in endurance sports including some high level triathlon in his 20’s, but trained considerably less throughout his 30’s. Now, in his mid 40’s, he has started training again with a focus on cycling and has been putting in a good amount of miles since the spring of 2022. He sent me a note yesterday about the gravel race in August and that he would like to perform at a high level at that event.

All that being said, I don’t actually know too much about his training other than what I see on Strava or when we see each other and chat a bit about what he is doing.

As it stands now, the race is 35 weeks away.

The next two tweets start the process of answering the question: “when should I start training?” As mentioned above, the first phase would be from now until about 24 weeks out from the race. I do not know how much or how little this athlete has recently been training, but anecdotally I can tell it’s much less than what he was doing during the 2022 summer and early fall. With this athlete’s triathlon background, and Colorado residence, my general recommendation about training would be to incorporate his aerobic work across a variety of mediums. It could be cycling, swimming, hiking, running, uphill skiing, rowing, cross country skiing, etc. However, I will say that he will need to be careful with running. Even though he has run a lot at various points in his life, he shouldn’t plan to ramp that up excessively in the near term. A nice combo might be run/hike terrain where he can get his heart rate up a bit while power-walking the uphills and jog the flats or downhills when they aren’t too technical and the overall risk of injury will be lower.

I didn’t mention it on twitter, but this can also be a good time to put on productive weight. This particular athlete is quite light and lean so I would suggest using this time to add some weight through strength training. He would likely need to put on extra fat to add the extra muscle, but I believe this would be a good overall strategy, leaving him with a bit of reserve on hand before the higher training loads of the late spring and summer.

Now we move into the next 12-week phase. During this time, I would advise the athlete to move away from a variety of activities and start logging more volume on the bike itself. Additionally, I mentioned that one long day should be done every 3-4 weeks that is above his baseline long ride. This phase of the training would be taking place on the tail end of winter and into the early months of spring in Colorado. As such, this plan could be implemented somewhat easily by being opportunistic on favorable weather weekends (or whenever he rides long). I also think that avoiding too many really big days in this period is important for maintaining some mojo reserve for when it really counts. I would not want the athlete to enter the final 12 weeks of their training feeling like they have already been grinding away for a long time.

The second point I made in the thread related to the introduction of higher intensity with the caveat of not generating a lot of fatigue. You can read one of the workouts I would suggest, involving 30 second intervals, on Gordo Byrn’s substack HERE. I would also start to alternate some tempo climbing and threshold work on different weeks, or even more spread apart than that, but I wouldn’t ramp up the total amount of work to a high amount. I would want him generally feeling like he could do more and would also encourage some flexibility within the sessions to add in more recovery if the efforts start feeling too forced, too soon. Finally, I would also suggest to start doing a few group rides within the 12-week block. During times like this, I’ll suggest to do group rides where the athlete shouldn’t “go looking for work.” In other words, they should respond to the times that are a bit harder as needed, but shouldn’t instigate it. Additionally, my preference would be to do shorter group rides where there might only be 20-40 minutes of mixed intensity instead of one of the bigger weekend group rides. Again, it’s all about getting in some variety without generating a lot of fatigue.

Now, we move into the final 12 weeks of the plan. This is the point where we start to incorporate work that is very specific to the race itself. Fortunately, in this day and age, there is a lot of data out there to look into what the demands of a race have been in the past and may be in the future. Last year, Boulder Legend Ben Delaney won the 100-mile SBT race and wrote an extensive report about what it took to do so. Using this sort of data can help formulate a tool box of fitness to potentially use on race day (depending on tactics). Now would be the time to enter into intensity sessions that will generate considerable fatigue and that simulate various portions of the race. Moreover, since the event is within driving distance, I would suggest he take a longer weekend (if possible) and recon the course. Assuming this would mean ~3 days of riding, I would break the course up across those days and work in some race intensity across the key selection points. For example, Delaney mentioned the selection point that occurred on the climb up to Steamboat Lake so I would probably suggest riding that climb twice: once at a comfortable rate and another at a rate slightly higher than race day projections.

Additionally, the longer rides within his training would now be more important and would need to be more specific to the race itself. This would be reflected not only in duration, but in terrain selection and intensity. Riding more and more on terrain that mirrors the course would be important as well as learning what fueling strategies/logistics need to be considered.

As mentioned in the final post of the thread on twitter, the time to start training is now, but the progression and specificity of training will change from today to race day. The steps over the next 35 weeks would move from general conditioning to “training to train” to race-specific preparation. Even though the training today may not be specific to the demands of race day, the cumulative effect will still matter.

There is no time like the present to get rolling.

Brooke Daerr
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